Mordechai Vanunu (Hebrew: מרדכי ואנונו; Hebrew pronunciation: [moʁdeˈχaj vaˈnunu]; Arabic: مردخاي فعنونو; Arabic pronunciation: [murdaxaj faʕnuːnu]; born 14 October 1952), also known as John Crossman, is an Israeli former nuclear technician and peace activist who, citing his opposition to weapons of mass destruction, revealed details of Israel's nuclear weapons program to the British press in 1986. He was subsequently lured from Britain to Italy by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, where he was drugged and abducted. He was secretly transported to Israel and ultimately convicted in a trial that was held behind closed doors.
Vanunu spent 18 years in prison, including more than 11 in solitary confinement, though this type of punishment is not prescribed anywhere in Israel's penal code, nor imposed by his verdict. Released from prison in 2004, he was further subjected to a broad array of restrictions on his speech and his movement and arrested several times for violations of his parole terms, giving interviews to foreign journalists and attempting to leave Israel. He claims to have suffered from "cruel and barbaric treatment" at the hands of prison authorities, and suggests that things would have been different if he had not converted to Christianity.
In 2007 Vanunu was sentenced to six months in prison for violating terms of his parole. The sentence was considered unusually severe even by the prosecution, who expected a suspended sentence. In response, Amnesty International issued a press release in July 2007, stating that "The organization considers Mordechai Vanunu to be a prisoner of conscience and calls for his immediate and unconditional release." In May 2010 Vanunu was arrested again and sentenced to three months in jail on a charge that he had met foreigners, in violation of conditions of his 2004 release from prison.
Vanunu has been characterized internationally as a whistleblower. American whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg has referred to him as "the preeminent hero of the nuclear era". In 1987, he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for "his courage and self-sacrifice in revealing the extent of Israel's nuclear weapons program". Israel claims and regards Vanunu as a traitor.
Vanunu was born in Marrakesh, Morocco, in 1952. He was the second of 11 children born to an Orthodox Jewish family that lived in the city's mellah, or Jewish quarter. His father, Shlomo, ran a grocery store, and his mother, Mazal, was a housewife. Vanunu studied in an Alliance française school, and a Jewish religious elementary school, or cheder. In 1963 Vanunu's father sold his business, and the family emigrated to Israel. Vanunu was ten years old at the time. The family transited through France, spending a month in a camp in Marseille before being taken to Israel by sea. Upon arrival in Israel, the family was sent by the Jewish Agency to settle at Beersheba, which at that time was an impoverished desert city. During their first year in Israel, the family lived in a small wooden hut without electricity.
Vanunu's father purchased a small grocery store in the town's market area, and the family moved into an apartment. Vanunu's father devoted his spare time to religious studies. He came to be regarded as a rabbi, earning respect in the market. Vanunu was sent to a Yeshiva Tichonit, a religious elementary school on the outskirts of town, which mixed religious and conventional studies.
After completing the 8th grade, his parents enrolled him in a yeshiva, but after three months he was withdrawn. For high school, Vanunu attended Yeshivat Ohel Shlomo high school, a Bnei Akiva-run school, where he was an excellent student, earning honors. According to Vanunu, whilst in secondary school, he had a personal crisis which led to him deciding not to observe religious Judaism. In an interview, he said that "already at this stage, I decided to cut myself off from the Jewish religion, but I didn't want to have a confrontation with my parents because I wanted to complete my studies".
He finished high school with a partial matriculation. Vanunu's parents wanted him to attend a higher yeshiva; he agreed but left after a week. He then found a temporary job in the court archives. In October 1971 he was conscripted into the Israel Defense Forces. He tried to join the Israeli Air Force as a pilot, but after having been rejected by examiners, they sent him to the Combat Engineering Corps, where he became a sapper. After basic training, he completed a junior commanders' course, then a non-commissioned officers course, and was given the rank of Sergeant-Major.
He was stationed in a highlands area and saw action during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. In 1974 he participated in the demolition of army installations in areas of the Golan that were to be returned to Syrian control. Vanunu was offered a permanent job with the army as a career soldier, but declined the offer, and was honorably discharged in 1974. He then enrolled at Tel Aviv University and entered a pre-academic course, completing his matriculation, then began studying physics. During this period he worked in a variety of places, including in a bakery and retirement home. After failing two exams at the end of his first year and realizing that the full-time work he needed to do to pay his tuition interfered with his studies, Vanunu suspended his studies and returned to his parents' home in Beersheba, where he found temporary work.
In 1976, Vanunu applied for a job at the Negev Nuclear Research Center, an Israeli facility used to develop and manufacture nuclear weapons located in the Negev Desert south of Dimona. Most worldwide intelligence agencies estimate that Israel developed nuclear weapons as early as the 1960s, but the country has intentionally maintained a "nuclear ambiguity", neither acknowledging nor denying that it possesses nuclear weapons. Vanunu had heard from a friend of his brother Meir that well-paying jobs were being advertised by the facility.
After a lengthy interview with the facility's security officer, he was accepted for training. He signed a contract forbidding disclosure of sensitive security materials and had to promise not to visit any Arab or Communist countries for five years after his employment at the facility ended. He passed health checks, after which his training began. He was put through an intensive training course in physics, chemistry, mathematics, first aid, fire drill, and English. He did sufficiently well to be accepted and was employed as a nuclear plant technician and shift manager in February 1977. Vanunu earned a high salary by Israeli standards, and lived well. His work record was so good he qualified for a car and telephone allowance, though he had no interest in either and simply had his brother Meir's car registered in his name and had the telephone installed at his parents' house.
In 1979 he enrolled at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beersheba. Initially he wanted to study engineering, but within a week switched to economics, and also began a Greek philosophy course. In the autumn of 1980, he took a backpacking trip through Europe. He toured London, Amsterdam, Germany, and Scandinavia, and then visited Greece and toured the Greek islands with a Canadian friend. After returning to Israel, he bought a flat in Beersheba. In the summer of 1983 he took a three-month trip to the United States and Canada with a friend, transiting through Ireland in the process on a charter flight through Shannon Airport. This was in direct violation of instructions from his workplace, which mandated direct flights to North America only, in case of hijacking. Upon his return he was threatened with a disciplinary tribunal, but this never happened.
Political views and activities
His political views had begun to change and he became critical of many policies of the Israeli government. He opposed the 1982 Lebanon War, and when he was called up to serve in that war as a reserve soldier in the Engineering Corps, he refused to perform field tasks and instead did kitchen duty. He campaigned for equal rights for Arab Israelis. In March 1984, he formed a left-wing group called "Campus" with five Arab and four Jewish students. He became acquainted with many Arab students, including pro-PLO activists. Vanunu was also affiliated with a group called "Movement for the Advancement of Peace". He developed a particular resentment for what he viewed as the dominance of Israeli society by Ashkenazi Jews or Jews of European origin, and discrimination against Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews from the Middle East and North Africa. He felt that he was looked down on by those who ran the Dimona facility due to his Moroccan origin. According to Dr. Ze'ev Tzahor of Ben-Gurion University, "he projected a deep sense of deprivation. He assumed an Ashkenazi dominance in Israel that encompassed all social strata and an Ashkenazi consensus closing off all possibilities of advancement for Oriental Jews." According to The Jerusalem Post, Vanunu's anti-Ashkenazi feelings morphed into anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli feelings, and he became the principal advocate for Arab students on campus, arguing their case with what other Jewish students saw as irrational intensity.